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Show Hot furs expensive Two northern Utah men have been convicted of illegally posessing bobcat furs, worth about $20,000. Clifton C. Steele and his nephew, Alan K. Steele, both of Santaquin were found guilty of having 80 illegal pelts in their posession, a class B misdemeanor. The verdict was handed down by a jury in the Ninth Circuit Court, before Judge Christian Ronnow. The pair was fined the maximum of $299 each for the violation, ordered to pay $2,000 in restitution for the cats and placed on unsupervised probation. Ronnow said that he was placing the men on probation to be certain they paid the $2,000 restitution, but that he felt since the men are employed and otherwise apparently law-abiding citizens, he did not feel it necessary to involve the State Adult Parole and Probation Department. The men were arrested in Cedar City in late February after an extensive ex-tensive investigation of illegal fur traffic in the state. Pelts were confiscated and turned over to the Utah Division of Wildlife Resources where they will be held for 10 days, pending appeal. They will then be auctioned off by the division. |